High Resolution Reservoir Simulator Driven Custom Scripts as the Enabler for Solving Reservoir to Surface Network Coupling Challenges

This paper presents a practical methodology of optimizing and building a detailed field surface network system by using the high-resolution reservoir simulator driven custom-made Python scripts to efficiently predict the future performance of the vast oil and gas-condensate carbonate field. All existing surface hydraulic tables are quality checked and lifting issue constraints corrected. Pressure losses at the wellhead chokes incorporated into the high-resolution reservoir simulator in the form of equation by using the custom scripts instead of a table format to calculate gas rate dependent pressure losses more precisely. Consequently, all 400+ surface production system manifolds, pipes and well chokes Horizontal Flow Performance (HFP) tables are updated and coupled to the reservoir simulator through Field Management (FM) controller which in turn generates Inflow Performance Relationship (IPR) tables for the coupled wells and passes them to solve the network. The methodology described in this paper applied for a complex field development planning of the Karachaganak. At present, reservoir management strategy requires constant balancing effort to uniformly spread gas re-injection into the lower Voidage Replacement Ratio areas in the Upper Gas-Condensate part of the reservoir due to reservoir heterogeneity. Additionally, an increase in field and wells gas-oil ratio and water-cut creates bottlenecks in the surface gathering system and requires robust solutions to decongest the surface network. Current simulation tools are not always effective due longer run times and simulation instability due to complex network system. As a solution, project-specific network balancing challenges are resolved by incorporating custom-made scripts into the high-resolution simulator. Faster and flexible integrated model based on hydraulic tables reproduced the historical pressure losses of the surface pipelines at similar resolution and generated accurate prediction profiles in a twice-quicker time than existing reservoir simulator. Overall, this approach helped to generate more stable production profiles by identifying bottlenecks in the surface network and evaluate future projects with more confidence by achieving a significant CAPEX cost savings. The comprehensive guidelines provided in this paper can aid reservoir modeling by setting up flexible integrated models to account for surface network effects. The value of incorporating Python scripts demonstrated to implement non-standard and project specific network balancing solutions leveraging on the flexibility and the openness of the modelling tool.